My first day. It was memorable – well of course it was memorable. If it weren’t memorable then why would I be writing this right now? I mean, who would care? That’s not a very good start I guess. I haven’t ever been very good at these… not since… my first day.
I guess I should start the story at the beginning and work from there. It is a very simple story really. There are very few plot twists and little character development. I’m sure this, if it ever gets popular enough to be published, will be put into the fiction section. Maybe even science fiction. It is true though. Well… as true as one can be without fearing repercussions.
People will try to tell you that this whole episode – my whole reason for being – is simply a metaphor for something else. Something that never really happened. A government conspiracy to promote gun control and internet restrictions, but I am living proof to the contrary. I cannot make you believe my story – sometimes I don’t believe it myself – all I ask is that you listen. And maybe, just maybe, we will all learn something from it.
It was my first day. I was only 14 or 15 at the time, but I can still remember it just like it was yesterday. How old am I now you ask? I cannot tell you. It’s complicated. I really cannot divulge much more information about myself than what is necessary for this story (autobiography). In fact, it is only now that I can legally talk about it, even though it was splattered on every newspaper and TV channel out there. Why you ask? I fear them. I fear the people who were involved. The people who tortured me. They took my soul. No, I cannot tell you much about myself, and for that I apologize, but it is how this is going to work.
I was skinny then. At least I thought I was skinny. I may still be skinny, I do not know. My image of myself has become so skewed and contorted that I… I just don’t know what to do. It’s as if by standing up for my rights and myself I lost more than I gained.
I got dressed by myself that day. I guess you might think it weird for me to say that about a teenage boy, but I have no sense of fashion. I’m not going to try and deny it. Sometimes, when I am forced to dress myself, people comment sarcastically about my dress. I usually say that I dressed in the dark or something like that. It is a very lame excuse I realize, but I am not self-assured enough to simply push the comments off and move on. People will try to tell you to do that all the time. Mostly people who do try to tell you that, can’t even do it themselves. Most people, I’ve come to realize, are hypocrites. Not only that, but I can’t dress myself now.
My parents were both away on some cruise or something. They were always taking cruises and vacations and hiatuses. Prodigal is what they are. What they were. My first day at a new school, in a new town, and they were not here. That is not entirely surprising to me, looking back. I guess I should have expected it. They were never there for anything: awards, games, parties, meetings. I do not blame them, mind you. If I was as disliked by everyone as they were, I’d probably move to a different town and never be around for any of my son’s activities either.
I woke up early. That is what I told them anyway. The truth is I did not sleep that night. All the time I had things going through my mind. Questions. Sometimes my mind just runs on its own without asking me first. If it had, asked me that is, I probably would have let it go anyway. A person can figure out a great deal of things when their mind is not restrained by social rules. Of course, it can also do nothing more than disturb you greatly.
I don’t really know what time it was that I drug myself out of bed. My life is ironic in a sense. I did not even want to go to school that day. You’re probably thinking that I didn’t want to go to school on any day. That this was just some sort of lame excuse, but it wasn’t. I have something of a sixth sense about things like this. I can usually tell if I’m going to have a bad day and it would be better to just say in bed. I do not often listen to myself, but I usually know when something like that is going to happen.
It was a fairly big school, about 1,000 students or so. Walking up to it I could see the different cliques as prominent as day: goths, nerds, preps, jocks, druggies, etc… This wasn’t anything new for me, I have had this type of segregation throughout my life in different schools and different towns. In fact, the only way I can tell one school from another is what part of the country we were residing at the time. Some regions call carbonated water with assorted flavors and colors “pop,” while still others may call it “soda” or “coke.” It’s kind of odd that way.
They didn’t have a schedule for me in the main office (typical of schools to expect you to have your homework done, even though they usually don’t have it done themselves), so they had me sit in on some class. As I was shown my chair the principal went over to talk to the teacher. I could tell right away that it was a higher-level class because a vast majority of the students in there were of the “prep” clique. You may, at this point, want to call me a stereotypical asshole, but anyone who has seen the cliques from outside of a clique can spot them with decent accuracy.
If you wanted to call me a stereotypical asshole earlier, you’re going to love this. I’m going to describe the teacher of this class now. I will try to do it with as much political correctness as I can, but there are just certain parts of the body that you cannot describe PC. She was a very attractive, young teacher. She wore a white blouse, tight skirt and she sat on the front of her desk with her legs crossed in front of her. If you did not know any better you may mistake her for a supermodel or a professional volleyball player. She had the build for it: muscular (but not too muscular) thighs, small and peaked breasts, short blonde hair and a terrific tan.
The principal left after they had talked for a few minutes and she had written something on a piece of paper she was holding. Her mouth moved but I couldn’t hear any of the sound that was coming out of it. I admired her small red lips. I wondered what she had used those lips for and I couldn’t help wonder if they had ever helped her get a job – this job. Right after I thought that she looked directly at me. She uncrossed and then re-crossed her legs. I caught a glimpse of her white cotton panties. Her hand rose off of the desk and motioned for me to come to her. I looked around for a moment to make sure that she had called me, then got up and walked over to stand in front of her. She uncrossed her legs, grabbed the front of my shirt, and forcefully pulled me to her. Our lips met in an almost violent kiss as her legs wrapped around my waist. My hands moved to her face and then down to start unbuttoning her shirt. She stopped me and ripped her shirt off, which shot buttons in all directions.
I moved my hands over her silky smooth skin as she arched her back to meet my hands. She made a low, throaty growl and then gasped my name.
Her excitement made me bold. I became the aggressor and kissed her again so passionately that she was left breathless. When I stopped she looked into my eyes, her own deep with desire, and started to unbutton my shirt. My name escaped her lips once more.
For a moment I wondered what the rest of the class was doing and what they were thinking about this awkward form of exhibitionism. I looked behind me to see that they were all watching intently, as if I were now the teacher and were going to teach them the art of lovemaking. My bravado had reached its peak. I started to unzip my pants so that I could enter her. Just before I did she yelled my name once more.
I snapped back to reality with a start.
“Here,” I said, as I realized she was calling role. Several people in the room snickered. They did not know what I was thinking… or maybe they did since most all teenagers have fantasies of that sort from time to time. It mattered not, just so long as the teacher did not ask me to get up from my chair for a while.
She called another name just as a loud sound emanated from the halls. Everyone turned to look. Out of shock, the room grew ominously quiet. A moment later a few people started to giggle as they thought that someone had let a cherry bomb explode. More and more started to giggle. I did not.
The teacher called another name, but I was not paying attention. I was transfixed on watching the door to the room. There was nothing novel about it. It was simply a wooden door with a semi-translucent pane of glass near the middle. I kept watching that pane of glass as the teacher proceeded with role. My mind flashed through all of the things that were going to appear in that window at any moment.
In the back of the room a child was still giggling. Then the giggling turned into laughter. A sort of laughter that should not come from anyone, deep and demonic. The laughter grew into a howl as everyone in the room looked at the person. Suddenly, there was a crash from the other side of the room. Two figures stood inside of what used to be a door. They were clad completely in black with ski masks, T-shirts advertising different rock bands, and black jeans.
“We are what you have created,” one shouted.
“We are the product of your society,” the other said.
“We are the children of the God-less.”
“We are your God.”
I saw the two figures raise pistols. At the same time I saw the teacher start to stand up in a vane attempt to stop the figures. I could not tell where one pistol was being aimed, but the other was directly at my head. I dove under my desk just as I heard a loud bang that resonated inside me. I don’t know if it was the sure volume of the blast that shook my innards, or the psychological impossibility of there being a gunshot in a school. I deftly made my way under my desk. At the same time I saw the teacher’s muscular and tanned legs crumple lifelessly under her in slow motion.
There are several misconceptions about bullets that people have. I don’t know where they get them – TV or movies probably – but let me attempt to clear some of them up. When a person is shot, the bullet rarely goes straight through them. It can bounce off bone or sinew to the point of coming out of nearly the same hole it went in.
As her chest came into view from under my desk, I could hardly make out the misting of blood that the white blouse had received. More and more of her came into view. Her right arm and head broke the new horizon I had created for myself. As her left shoulder made contact with the grey carpet, her head continued on its trek to the floor. Her eyes stared lifelessly at me as her head bounced and a pink substance spurted from the hole in her forehead. It landed a few inches from my face. Every half-second or so, another stream would flow from the wound. I barely even noticed that her right ear was hanging by a few scraps of skin as her eyes stared straight at me.
“We have chosen who to smite. Anger us again and more shall suffer the same fate.”
The words had no meaning. They were simply disruptions in the air that broke the morbid silence that has befallen the classroom. I could not move, not even blink, as she stared at me with her blue eyes. She was making me feel guilty for having a mini-fantasy about her. Making me regret looking at her as a piece of meat instead of a person. Damn her… why did she have to know? It was in my head. It was my fantasy, why did she have to know?
The pink substance stopped flowing out of her forehead. It had created a stain on the carpet about the size of one of those small plastic swimming pools that you fill up with the garden hose. I could not move. She was still staring at me. The only thing that brought me out of my self-induced coma was the crying and sniffling that was going on behind me. My eyes reluctantly moved from their vigil to look to my left. I saw the person there, who should have been tucked safely under their desk, lying on the ground. They were also dead. I wondered, very briefly, if I was the only one alive. I stood up to find out. Turning completely around I found the black figures still in the doorway. What was I going to say: “Why are you doing this?” “Give me your guns.” “It can end here.”
Suddenly, I became angry. They were the ones who let the teacher know my secrets when she looked at me. They were the ones who had allowed her to die without giving someone a final goodbye, or a kiss, or a hug, or something. They were the killers. My body tensed as I prepared to make a leap at them. Slowly, almost casually, one lifted his gun to point at me again.
The rest of the day is a blur to me. I remember the cops and the news people. I wondered if either of them were there to really help any of us. Afterwards were funerals, interviews and accusations.
Accusations.
They tried to blame everybody and everything: parents, games, music, movies, media, drugs, sex, violence, social pressure, cliques, etc… Of course, blaming someone does not make anything better for anyone. People died. But one… one of them died because of me. Because of my cowardice. When I ducked under my desk the person behind me was killed. The bullet that was intended for me, if it was intended for anyone. I haven’t been able to let the blame go. I know that it’s not my fault. I know that in situations like that it is survival of the fittest, and who’s to say that I didn’t get what I deserved? I am here, shot in the throat, and paralyzed from the bottom of my jaw down. The child’s parents forgave me, of course… in front of the cameras. The policemen tried to give me a badge because of my heroism. How heroic would I seem if they knew what I was thinking? What would they think if they knew that their hero was nothing more than a kid with a dirty and guilty conscience?
I’m just a mime, when you think about it. A mime who created a box to hold all of his deceit, evil, and sins. In the box is me.
